Man it’s been a long time since YHC has written a backblast. And while I’d love to blame it on that insanely good BB Hawg dropped on us last week (I mean, who wants to follow that?), it is of course out of pure laziness. So thanks to today’s special guest for helping to get me back on track.
Usual warmorama, went something like this: arm circles, cherry pickers, windmills, imperial walkers, seal jacks, toe touches, all IC at or around 15x.
Thang: Started things off pretty foolishly, considering the Nightmare was a mere two days ago: a Merkin Mile to the tunnel. That’s 1/4 mile, x25 merkins, 1/4 mile, x25 merkins, etc. Once we hit a mile at the tunnel, and 100 merkins, we partnered up for:
Wilt Chamberlains, or some modification of it: 100 LBC’s, 100 squats, 100 flutters (2-count) and 100 lunges. Cumulative count, with P1 running down to the base and backwards back up for the flapjack.
Modified Merkin Mile back to the flag, with only half the merkins (that’s right, only 50 this time, that’s it. Not like Hammer and I didn’t do 400 two days ago), back for just enough Mary with a guest appearance by our own Backdraft, back from Gitmo! In his prolonged absence he had all the times wrong, but hey, we were happy to catch even a few minutes of him.
Mary was leg raises, Putins, Jane Fonda’s (including all three stages: plain jane’s, quick pulses, and heel-to-knees).
COT with Pik praying us out. Welcome back-Draft, it’s great to have you posting again. Start recruiting some of your friends for next year’s Ivan, seriously, it’s never too early to start plotting.
Thanks to Goose for stepping up to Q ( a VQ no less!) this Saturday, let’s all post to support… and thanks men for posting this morning, for getting me out the sack, and allowing me to lead such a great group of men. It’s always a pleasure.
It wasn’t particularly gloomy this morning (instead it was crisp, bright and clear). But it was pretty darn cold, at least compared to the warm winter we’ve had thus far. Given the conditions, it might’ve been a wise idea to make the trip down to the lake and witness the rare, clear night sky. But YHC is not, in fact, a wise man, so instead we opted for a simple trip around the Marsh, x2.
YHC has gotten into the bad habit of trying to lose the always-fashionably-late Cowbell during the warmorama. So after a quick set of SSH, we took the warmup on the road. A short mosey down Lamarque and we heard a car behind us, accompanied by flashing lights. Then we heard some loud grumbling and realized it was actually the Wacker of Bushes that we had left behind.
After some hustling, he caught the group at our first cross street, just in time for the first of 3 warmup stations: Seal Jacks, toe touches, and high knees. Mosey to the next street for: torso twists, windmills, butt kicks. And onward to the final intersection for: squats, imperial walkers, and x10 merkins OYO.
Back to the start the make the trip once more, but this time:
Bear crawl to first cross street, then shoulder taps x40 IC.
Lunge walk to next street, big boy sit-ups x40.
Broad Jump/Bunny Hops to next street, T – Merkins x40. (ouch!)
Mosey to final cross street, 180º jump squats, x40.
Each block is about 200 yards, so this one took a bit off the clock. But the simplicity of the routine made it a good time to catch up with the guys: talk about the Ivan, talk about our weekends, talk about the new neighbors on Lamarque who, unbeknownst to us, have been watching us each Monday morning, fondly referring to us as, “those crazy guys.” We saved the 180º jump squats specifically for their intersection to further our reputation. (Yes, of course I had considered monkey humpers, but then thought that it was a) too obvious, and that b) by the way the refer to us, they had likely already witnessed that one.)
Next up we quickly hit the pull-up bars for x15, then the benches for x20 freaks (IC), before settling back in center court for some Mary (Putins, Freddie’s, and Leg Raises, x20 IC).
COT with Pik praying us out. I’m incredibly thankful for the beautiful weather this morning, and for you three men who reliably post each week.
With the emotional pain 😢of the Saints last-play, crushing defeat at the hands of the all-to-familiar Minnesota Vikings, coupled with the immediate aftermath of Frankie C’s Hundo 👏🏻👊🏻YHC figured spirits would be subdued and the PAX of F3 Northshore might just Opt for an extra hour of sleep 😴 in the gloom. But, as Lee corso✏️ likes to say, “Not so fast, my friend.” YHC was delighted 🤩to greeted by Akbar and The Hammer upon arriving at the AO.
YHC led the men through a brief warmup consisting of SSHs, arm circles, HK, and BKs.
With the intent to provide the PAX (YHC wanted to gripe about the Saints game) a chance to vent about the saints game and to also recap the Hundo, a running beatdown (👎🏼Sean-#7 💪🏻was bruising 🏋️♀️Sunday) Full of FUMBLE 🏈chatter was on today’s gloomy 🌒menu.
Start by moseying toward the lakefront 🌊, stopping 🚦at each intersection to do 10 reps of the following 6 exercises: merkins, smurf jacks, stars, squats, rower sit-ups, and plank jacks. The PAX took a circuitous route through Old Mandeville eventually Heading back to the marsh just in time for the closing 🔔.
Count off, cot and thanks to the hammer for praying us out.
While a few soldier Pax were recovering from Tanked Up’s overnight 100k Hundo, the rest of us got to work on a clear Breesy Saturday before the Saints stick it to the Vikings on Sunday.
Pre-thang 2 miler with Turbo, Pik, Freon, Zoo, and FNG Paul.
We warmed up with Imperial Walkers, Squats, Imperial Squat Walkers, Side Straddle Hops, Sleep Walker 123 (up to 5), and Merkins
Mosey to Noah’s Ark where Freon took the Q / VQ, and led the beat down, which like Brees’ and Thomas’ records, was nothing short of spectacular. It went like this:
3 Rounds:
High Knees 60 50 40
Mountain Climbers 30 40 46
Straight Leg Sprints 50 40 30
—Recovery Run around the Ark—
Gorilla Crawls 16 20 26
Jimmie Jumps 50 40 30
Triple Bear 15 20 21
Frog Burpees 25 20 15
—Recovery Run around the Ark—
For a total of 684 reps equivalent to the sum of Brees’ and Thomas’ record breaking stats (540 all time touchdowns + 144 receptions = 684)
YHC resumed the Q for some work on the Lake Wall. Irkins, Box Jumps, Derkins, Freak Nasties, Burpee Box Jumps
Indian Run back to the shovel flag where the Pax indulged QIC with a Kenpo Kooldown.
Excellent work, Freon! YHC was not feeling creative for this beatdown and enlisted Freon last minute for some hurry-up offense. Not only did he Co-Q/VQ, but he EH’d Psycho and brought FNG Paul, now known as Jukebox.
Psycho, having escaped the Bates Motel to support Freon, prayed us out.
The theme of the day was a Tabata Workout at the Marsh.
Warmup of Good Mornings, Windmills, Arm Circles (forward and reverse), then mosey over to playground for a quick set of 5 pull ups. Last warmup was Mosey around the block before…
The THANG started…
Sets of 1 minute Tabata AMRAP workouts: Merkins, Squats, One leg hop-overs, Peter Parkers. After 4 exercises, the PAX ran around the block for a quick reset. Second set was Freddy Mercuries, Pull Ups, One leg hop overs (other leg), and Plank Jacks. Last set: Smurf Jacks, Chill cut plank hold, Flutter Kicks, Lunge Walk.
With a couple of minutes to spare, the PAX hammered out another set of merkins, and ISI 24 Jump Squats.
Thanks for getting up early today, men! Thanks for following my lead and inspiring me to become a better leader.
You’d think with Cowbell returning from the Virgin Islands and YHC returning from a beach trip in Panama City this weekend, that we wouldn’t need all the hats/gloves/tights today. And yet most of us – precluding Shooter, of course – did arrive to this morning’s 34º gloom with the above-mentioned winter accessories.
But of course we warmed up quickly and began shedding the layers. Started things off with: good mornings, windmills, arm circles forward, arm circles backwards, air presses, SSHs, seal jacks, IWs, and hillbillies. (Ranging from 10x for the slowish ones to 20x for the faster ones.)
Then, because YHC was having second thoughts about certain sections of my planned beatdown, we took a mosey around the perimeter of the trailhead to give me time to think. Once back, we finally dove in:
Partner up at the head of the corridor: P1 will do burpee broad jumps while P2 runs the stairs and back to relieve P1. Journey across the courtyard and all the way back to the start.
Second Partner Corridor Exercise: P1 does 4x lunges, 8x squats across, while P2 runs up stairs and back to relieve. Across and back again.
Next, recovery walk over to the stage for some Balls To The Wall. YHC has probably only done BTTW once before, and had originally planned to do 60 seconds of it sprinkled a few times throughout the beatdown. That got shut down real quick after we recovered from our first minute.
Stayed with that same section of the stage wall, this time for a People’s Chair with overhead air presses, increased the time to 75 seconds.
After that, grab a partner for some Lazy Doras. Cowbell introduced this one to the Northshore PAX during his first F2 event, and it was no bueno. So YHC figured why not inflict it on the unsuspecting men this morning?
P1 10 merkins while P2 planks, swap until you’ve reached 100
P1 15 squats while P2 Al Gores, up to cumulative 150
P1 20 LBC’s, while P2 holds legs 6″ off ground, up to 200
A slowesy back to the corridor for the combo sprints/peter parkers/parker peters that I’m so fond of, and then it was time for Mary: flutter kicks, Hello Dolly’s, and Rosalie’s to wrap it up.
COT and Zoo prayed us out, with special intentions for his sister and her family, who lost their house to a fire last weekend. Lift them up this week as they deal with the loss.
Thanks men for the spur to get out of bed on cold mornings like this one, and the opportunity to lead and get sharper!
For various reasons, YHC has been away from the gloomy streets of Old Mandeville, unable to post at the Scramble and the Marsh (YHC’s 2 favorite AOs) on a regular basis for the last 3 months. But today was different! YHC was excited to be back out ratting the streets with some of his runnin podnuhs. Here’s to hoping for more posts in the future.
Here’s a LOOSE description of what went down and who was there to attest.
Thang: Mosey over to workout Equipment for 3 sets of Pull ups x 5, alternating w/ 10 squats.
Mosey to Lakefront, stopping at each intersection for some exercises: Putins, Leg Raises, Crunchy Frogs, Merkins, Mountain Climbers, Peter Parkers, Al Gores, Chill Cut Planks. Then off to Rips for some up and over work before heading back to the Marsh to close out.
Thanks to the always loquacious Bushwacker for praying us out!
Good to be back out there in the gloom with you men. F3–Always pushing ahead, always pushing forward!
10 men braved the Olga aftermath to see what was on the No Power Menu this past Saturday. YHC may not be able to remember much of what was actually on the menu, but I can tell you what was not on the menu: a fun game of mud football wasn’t (or, really, any “fun” in general); a beatdown with a clear vision wasn’t; and a fast cup of strong coffee at coffeeteria wasn’t either. But more on that later.
First, there was much mumblechatter and confusion as to what exactly happened to Wacker. He had posted on the GroupMe that Olga had “slipped in last night and screwed things up.” But many men hadn’t heard that the tropical storm had been named and so, naturally, thought a Russian woman had slipped into Bush’s bed. Obviously, there was a lot of concern and alarm until it was revealed Olga was “not the Russian lady he did that run with a few weeks ago.”
Now, the beatdown. Nevermind that YHC can’t remember the specifics of the warmorama (it’s pretty much the same 15 or so exercises anyway, right?), more of note was that it had to be the darkest warmorama on record. With the power out in the entire neighborhood, it really couldn’t be any darker (unless, of course, we lost the light coming from Hammer and Pik’s phones). YHC kept thinking, how can we do anything in this darkness? No bear crawls, no suicides – what are we gonna just sit in a circle and do side straddle hops all morning??
So… after some SSH’s, we carefully tread over to the playground equipment for a round of 7’s: pull-ups to merkins. Then over to the benches for a second set of 7’s: Freak Nasties to Bulgarians (admittedly, Bulgarians were a bit ill-conceived due to the awkwardness of having to do each leg).
Then carefully back to center court for a set of 1 minute AMRAPs, dealer’s choice: we went around the circle and each man picked an exercise. I can’t remember the exercises: there were merkins, there were jump squats, there were burpees, oh, and then Maverick showed up about this time and made us do Merkins again.
After that, Tank mercifully took the Q for a moment, just as light was starting to peek through. He had us do runs across the court, with a merkin at each end. About 5 laps here to get the heart rate going.
YHC took the Q back for what I thought could be an interesting one: partner up for the slowest Catch Me If You Can ever. P1 will inchworm down the block, P2 will perform 10 merkins, 10 squats, and 10 LBCs, before bear crawling to catch and replace P1. YHC thought it would be fun to go sightseeing down the block (now that there was light) where there were downed power lines, fallen trees, frantic cars, and all sorts of other fun stuff to dodge. But the wise Hammer pulled us back to the safety of the court. This exercise turned out to be not so fun in the end anyway.
Then we split into two teams of 5 and did a relay race across the court. Jose ran so fast that I think he ran straight outta the court and into the home across the street, but he did seal the tie for his team. So, 20 burpees for all.
And… what else? Ah, we finished with a round of Mary: again, a 1 minute AMRAP, dealer’s choice, around the circle. And again, YHC cannot recall the exact exercises, but does remember that Pik had us do calf raises, because I remember thinking, “this isn’t core,” but hey, fair game nonetheless. And Turbo had us do Scuba Steves. And Jose pulled out his fave – Jane Fondas, 1 minute each leg to close it all out.
COT where Tank took center stage to announce the Hundo, which is gaining some traction despite its utter insanity. You gotta love these guys. Akbar prayed us out and then we were on our way in search of coffee. Despite the citywide outage, this group of stragglers wouldn’t take no for an answer and found the local Waffle House to be incredibly accommodating despite the lack of power. T-claps to our cheery waitress, who put up with Hammer’s constant tea refills and a bunch of sweaty guys that had no intention of eating. In the company of these men, that weak, slow-drip coffee was some of the best I’ve ever had.
So while we may never know if those eighteen year olds were able to pull their truck out with bungee cords, like much in life, some things are just better left to the imagination. Gents, thanks for the opportunity to co-lead with Tank, I believe I can speak for both of us when I say that it’s a privilege and honor that we don’t take for granted.
Like the men of F3, Waffle House plans for the expected, but is prepared for the unexpected.
The Killer B’s ended with a bang Saturday morning, with Grundy taking the Northshore lead by mere seconds. Sure, we could debate the fairness of doing it on the lakefront’s luxurious grass vs. the Marsh’s unyielding concrete, or the legality of the proctor himself taking home first place, but when it comes down to it, we must (begrudgingly) give Grundy due credit (and hate!) – it was a pretty inspirational effort. In fact, Tank was nipping at his heels the entire time and it seems the two were feeding off one another’s energy to push each other to their record times.
So t-claps to those two men for giving it their all and, while we’re t-clapping, we might as well toss another one out to Zoo and his miraculous self-healing leg, for taking the opportunity to hit the challenge for a second time and improve upon his score. Alright, the rundown:
Usual pre-thang 2 miler featured guest appearances by both Bushwacker and Garfield, and then we went right into the warmorama: Arm circles (forward/back), IW’s, copperhead squats, toe touches, hillbillies, SSHs, mountain climbers, all x20 IC.
Thang: Half the PAX followed Grundy to complete the IP challenge, while those that had already had their fill followed YHC.
First stop on our tour of the lakefront was an old favorite that can be difficult to use with a large pax: Rips. Instead of the traditional stair run/Rocky Balboa’s, though, we simply grabbed a handrail and did one legged negative calf raises, at a slow cadence: x15 per leg.
Then, eastward towards the baseball field, stopping for a quick COP of high knees and a burpee wave. About 6 rounds, and then onward…
To the pull-up bars behind the baseball field. Circled up on our six for flutter kicks, while 2 men got up to do 5x pull-ups. Around the circle again and again and again, until each man had 25 pull-ups. We maxed out on flutters and at some point switched to Freddie Mercs, which did not really help all that much.
Next up, flip over to a plank for plank jacks, while 2 men got up to do hanging knee tucks x10. Round the circle a few times, switching about halfway to shoulder taps, until each man had 30 tucks.
Mosey back towards the boat launch to split into two teams for a 100-yard sprint relay race. Losing team gets hit with 25 burpees, winning team gets 25 merkins. (YHC has learned that, in the realm of F3, the winning team never takes the easy way and sits out on the work so why even bother pretending there’s a reward.) With Bean pulling double duty for Team 2 to secure the win, they performed their merkins and then jumped in to help Team 1 finish up with their burpees. And then everyone took a page from Pik, who’s been keeping Old Mandeville clean for the better part of two years, and did a quick sweep of beer bottles before heading over to the playground for a quick partner routine.
P1 holds people’s chair while doing air presses, P2 bear crawls up the small hill to the swingset pad for 10 merkins and then bunny hops back down to flapjack with P1.
Just enough time to Indian Run back to Rips, get in one more set of calf raises (x10 each leg this time), and back at the flag for a round of boxcutters, x20 IC. The rest of the gang joined us at this point, looking thoroughly destroyed, and we circled up for COT. Zoo encouraged all to share the gift of F3 and bring out some new brothers, and Maverick took us out with a prayer, encouraging us to be men of strength. Then off to coffeeteria. Thank you men for the opportunity not only to lead, but to get stronger and sharper alongside you.
Inspired by Chewy’s spate of back to back to back blasts, YHC figured it was time to put some fingers to the keyboard. I love to read these things, so why have I shirked my duty for my last 3 Q’s?
Alright, let’s forget the counts just this once, as I’ll be lucky to get the rest of it right:
Warmorama – SSH, IWs, Cherry Pickers, arm circles, air presses, etc.
And finally, high knees until called, then drop for a burpee…. round the circle we went, a few times.
Thang: Over to the pull-up bars, my favorite feature of the marsh. One man does 5 pull ups, while the rest of the pax does flutters. 5 rounds of this, (that’s 25 per man for you non-mathematicians) and then on to hanging knee tucks. 10 per man this time, while everyone does J-Los. 3 rounds here of this.
A long mosey from the warm confines of the Marsh to the warm expanse of the lakefront. Oh, forgot – we sprinted a few of those blocks. Maybe… 2? Then hit up the sea wall for none other than: Step Ups, Freaks, Bulgarians, Freaks, Step ups with Knee Raises, Freaks.
Over to a grassy spot for some Captain Thor, 1 sit-up to 4 putins, up to 10/40. This was Cowbell’s virgin Thor experience, he seemed to enjoy.
Mosey back to the Marsh, this time stopping at each corner to do 10 merkins. Switched it up each block, alternating between wide, diamond, T, and your plain ol’ average merkin.
COT and Cowbell prayed us out. Thanks gents for the opportunity to lead, and for keeping each other sharp. Love to start the week out here with you guys.
